


The Dreary Deaths and Disappearances in Kashiwa City

by ranichi17



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Kagerou Project
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Child Death, Conspiracy Theories, Episode Style, Fake Episode, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, POV Outsider, POV Third Person, Unreliable Narrator, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:00:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25900228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ranichi17/pseuds/ranichi17
Summary: “This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved we’re investigating the mystery regarding the dreary deaths and disappearances in Kashiwa City, a small town located in metropolitan Japan.”
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23





	The Dreary Deaths and Disappearances in Kashiwa City

**Author's Note:**

> Long time no KagePro! I was going to post this at 12:30 PM JST but then again I probably won't be awake at that hour, so here. Anyway, this fic is almost a year old but I just didn't get around to posting it. Figured KagePro day would be as good a time as anything else.

The sound of static electricity echoed as a light bulb swung on its own and came to life, illuminating the show’s title: _Buzzfeed Unsolved._

“This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved we’re investigating the mystery regarding the dreary deaths and disappearances in Kashiwa City, a small town located in metropolitan Japan,” Ryan began with a sideways glance to Shane. “Fair warning to our viewers, this episode touches upon potentially upsetting content, so tread lightly.”

“Any time you say we’ll have upsetting content, it’s not—” Shane started, fiddling with a pencil in his hand as he stared back at Ryan with a grimace. “It’s not a good look, Ryan.”

“Yeah. I know. But people keep requesting it, so here we go,” Ryan replied with a long–suffering expression just as the screen faded to black.

“On the afternoon of August 15th, 2011, sixteen–year–old Takane Enomoto, a student at the local high school in Kashiwa City, left the premises of Myouhei Hospital after visiting a classmate who was confined there.”

At this point, the screen shifted to show a grainy black and white photo of a girl wearing a nondescript high school uniform, her shoulder–length hair in identical pigtails and with the upper part of her face hidden by a shadow, showing only her smug smirk.

“According to her homeroom teacher, the last person to see her alive, Takane volunteered to go to school to pick up the stuff said classmate left behind in their classroom,” Ryan’s narration continued.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Shane said, as the screen shifted to a transcript of their usual banter. “What do you mean ‘go to school?’ Isn’t August summer in Japan?”

“I was just about to get to that point,” Ryan replied. “Apparently, she and that classmate were taking summer classes. And, get this, they were the only students in their class.”

“I mean, it’s summer class, _Ryan_ ,” Shane said, condescension dripping from his voice. “Why would that be weird?”

“The thing is,” Ryan expounded. “Even in regular semesters, there’s only these two kids in that class, which happens to be a Special Education class. And according to the forums I’ve visited, the school hasn’t had a class like that before _or_ after these two particular students.”

“Alright, so what happened to them?” Shane asked.

The screen shifted once again to show Ryan and Shane. Shane wore an amused expression on his face, clearly only humoring Ryan. Ryan meanwhile had his fingers steepled on the table, as if about to reveal a criminal mastermind.

Ryan’s face broke into a grin. “This is the part where it gets tricky. CCTV footage reveals Takane _did_ get to the school, but none of the cameras ever show her leaving.”

“Huh,” Shane said, nodding thoughtfully. “So you’re telling me, she just vanished into thin air?”

“Eeyup,” Ryan agreed, turning in his chair to face Shane. “And you wanna know what else?”

“No, Ryan, I don’t,” Shane said with a shit–eating grin.

Ryan rolled his eyes, but pressed on. “That classmate she had? He’d died that same day of a heart condition. At approximately around the same time she disappeared, in fact.”

“I don’t see how that’s related.”

“Oh, you will,” Ryan promised, facing the camera. “Anyway, let’s go back to the case.”

The screen went black, in preparation to back to its slideshow format as Ryan began his narration anew.

“You see,” started Ryan’s disembodied voice, as the screen showed a photo of a skyline of a seemingly–idyllic town. “These weren’t the only things that happened in this town that August 15th. In that same school complex, a student had jumped off the rooftop that same afternoon.”

“Yikes!” said Shane’s voice, the transcript returning to the screen. “I don’t like this case, Ryan!”

“Yeah, I know. Just… just stop interrupting me,” Ryan replied with a sigh.

“Fine!”

“Anyway, as I was saying,” Ryan said, clearing his throat. “A student jumped off the school rooftop the same afternoon a different one died and another disappeared into thin air. While this death is the least suspicious incident by far, as security cameras show she was alone when she went up to the roof, proving that this was indeed a suicide, well. It gets weirder.”

The screen shifts, showing photos of four people, one of them the previous photo of Takane while the rest remained unlabeled, and all of their faces hidden by a shadow.

“That student, later identified as Ayano Tateyama, was a year below Takane, and by all accounts I could find, they seemed to be best friends,” Ryan continued, as a line connects Takane’s photo with that of a short–haired girl wearing a scarf, as the name Ayano Tateyama fades in from underneath it. “Here’s how it gets weirder: Ayano’s father, Kenjirou Tateyama, was actually the homeroom teacher of Takane. And Kenjirou, as it turns out, was in the room when his other student died, whom obituaries identified as Haruka Kokonose.”

By this time, all four photos already bore the names of those identified, as Kenjirou’s photo rises to the top of the screen and all of them become connected by lines to form something resembling a pyramid.

“Now _that_ sounds fishy,” Shane exclaimed, as the screen shifted once again to show Shane with his pointer finger up in the air, facing Ryan.

“It really does, doesn’t it?” agreed Ryan, reclining against the desk to face Shane, his eyebrows knitted together as his lips set into a grimace. “But also, can you imagine what the poor man must have felt? His daughter commits suicide without warning, and then one of his students die while he’s in the same room, _and then_ his only other student disappears without a trace.”

“Must’ve been rough,” Shane said, nodding along. “Did he quit after that?”

“Oh, no, actually,” replied Ryan, pointing the eraser end of his pencil at Shane. “He’s still working at the school as a science teacher from what I’ve read.”

“Woah, _what?”_ Shane’s eyes widen as he stared at Ryan. “You’re telling me, this guy went through all that, and he’s still teaching?”

Ryan grinned back. “What a guy, right?”

“Yeah, definitely.”

“And now that that’s out of the way,” segued Ryan, turning to face the audience once again. “Let’s get into some theories.”

The screen faded, showing a black background with a splatter of red in the center of the screen, resembling blood, as the words _Theory #1_ fades into the forefront in white.

“The first theory comes from the results of the official police investigation. According to Detective Morofushi, chief investigator of the case, it’s possible that Takane took a shortcut through the woods near the school complex in order to return to the hospital faster and then afterwards got lost.”

“Seems pretty cut–and–dried to me,” remarked Shane.

Ryan tilted his head, not impressed. “Yeah, it does. Except if you remember, the security cameras never showed her leaving the school grounds, so…”

“So maybe there just wasn’t one available in the route she took to leave the school?” Shane finished for him.

“Maybe,” said Ryan, shrugging. “But then if that actually happened, why did they never find a body, or even any trace of her?”

“It’s the woods, Ryan,” Shane replied dryly, staring with a deadpan expression at Ryan. “Wild animals live in the woods. You don’t think she just got eaten by a bear or something?”

“In metropolitan Japan? I don’t think so.” Ryan shook his head, then turned to face the camera. “Do bears even live in Japan? Anyway, let’s get into the other theories.”

“Our second theory comes from a post in an online forum from someone who calls themselves ‘The Deceiver.’ According to them, there’s actually a conspiracy within the town. You see, this wasn’t an isolated incident. Every year on the 15th of August, there’s always someone who disappears from the town without a trace.”

“Why is that strange? People disappear all the time, Ryan,” said Shane, rolling his eyes. “Doesn’t mean there’s automatically a conspiracy.”

“No, _no,_ let me finish,” screeched Ryan, waving a hand towards Shane. _“As I was saying,_ these disappearances always occur alongside someone else having a near–death experience, and _always_ on the 15th of August. So much so, that there’s actually a folk legend about this.”

“Oh _no,”_ Shane said, sighing a long–suffering sigh. “Are you going to talk about aliens again?”

“No. Maybe? At least I know the folk legend talks about a medusa kind of creature? So no, not aliens,” replied Ryan, whose face reflected how he felt about this theory, that is, not impressed either. “What this legend suggests is that there’s a lonely medusa who sucks dying people into a black hole every 15th of August so she’ll have company. Sort of like a fairytale witch, except sometimes her black hole coughs up the person and gives them powers.”

“Uh, huh. So, you’re telling me,” started Shane, drawing a diagram in the air with his pencil. “This town has a neighborhood witch who saves dying people and gives them powers.”

“That’s what— That’s what the theory said!” Ryan said, going on the defensive. “Look, at least it’s not aliens.”

“True,” conceded Shane, nodding his head, still not buying it.

“Which brings us to our next theory: That her homeroom teacher had kidnapped her and is now doing experiments on her.”

“Wait, _what?”_

“Yeah, remember that guy?” said Ryan, grinning. “Apparently he and his wife were scientists who originally came to the town to study the folk legend. They even adopted three kids who were involved with the town’s little phenomenon.”

“Ryan,” sighed Shane. “What the fuck.”

“Again, that’s what the forum member said,” replied Ryan, raising both his eyebrows. “Also, according to this theory, the teacher himself was involved in the phenomenon, because on an August 15th a few years before our case, he and his wife were caught in a landslide, and his wife’s body was never found either. That said, apparently he was never the same after that landslide.”

“I mean, would _you_ be the same after your wife dies in a landslide?” Shane asked, staring back at Ryan.

“Okay, yeah, that’s fair,” said Ryan, frowning. “But according to this theory, after that incident, this teacher immersed himself further into the phenomenon, even acting like he was possessed at times.”

“Are you saying the fairytale witch possessed him to trap more victims? Ryan, this theory is too unhinged, even for you.”

“I’m just relating what the theory says, why do you always blame me?” replied Ryan, staring at Shane as though daring him to contradict again. “So anyway, the reason why Takane seemingly never left the school is that she’s still in there, held captive and having experiments done on her after she gets out of the black hole.”

Shane audibly groaned. “Oh, Ryan…”

“Shut up, Shane,” muttered Ryan, narrowing his eyes. “Final words, what do you think happened?”

“I think it was a bear,” Shane replied, tilting his head as he glares back at Ryan. “Or even any wild animal. It’s the woods, Ryan.”

“I think the third theory has some truth to it,” replied Ryan, shrugging. “And anyway, this _is_ still an active case, so you never know. Maybe I’m right.”

“Perhaps one day, we’ll finally discover what happened that fateful afternoon of August 15th. But until then, the case remains: _Unsolved.”_

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, it’s canon that Saeru as Kenjirou paid off the media and the police to not look too deeply into Takane’s disappearance, but do you really think that would stop the internet from speculating about it in forums? And anyway, as NinthFeather put it in one of their fics, you don’t have to get sucked into the heat haze to know that something isn’t right in the town. Hence, this fic.
> 
> As always, I also have a tumblr right [here](http://ranichi17.tumblr.com/).


End file.
